


The Mirror Hurts

by Xyz0608



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Angst, F/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-16
Updated: 2018-11-26
Packaged: 2019-08-24 06:03:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16634357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xyz0608/pseuds/Xyz0608
Summary: Cassian Andor  had been the Rebellion's best spy, simply because he knew better than to get distracted.Then Jyn Erso came barging into his life. And everything changed.(And yet, somehow, he couldn't find it in himself to regret it.)





	1. Chapter 1

Scarif was over.

 

The Death Star was destroyed.

 

They’d _survived._

 

(Hadn’t they?)

\------------------------------

 **(** **NOW** **)**

 

Cassian Andor had been the best spy in the Rebellion since he was fifteen years old. He knew death far too well -- he had caused it, had escaped it, far too many times to count. That was nothing new.

 _This_ was new, this… _thing_ , that existed whenever he stood in the same room as her. It was strange and unnatural and made him reckless; and then annoyed again because recklessness had no place in the life of a spy.

 _She_ caused it. Jyn Erso had come barging into his life and now nothing made sense the way it should have.

But somehow, he couldn’t find it in himself to regret any of it.

Even if it had led to this, there had to be something -- some kind of atonement, or justification -- that everything that had happened had happened to bring them to this point.

He had not followed Jyn Erso in going rogue for absolution (he was beyond that already); he had followed her because he _chose_ to do so.

Maybe Scarif was a suicide mission from the start, maybe it wasn’t. He didn’t know.

(He would’ve followed her regardless).

He pulled Jyn closer as the wrath of her father’s creation came roaring closer--

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN: Yavin IV** **)**

 

_She’s tiny._

That was Cassian’s immediate thought when he first laid eyes on Jyn Erso.

Word was she’d left her mark on the extraction team -- even hit Melshi over the head with a shovel, if the rumors were true. People talked about her time with the Partisans -- she’d been the best of the best then, apparently, held in reverence second only to that of Gerrera himself.

Cassian stayed in the shadows while she talked with Mothma, watching, assessing.

She was quick, defensive, her eyes darting around the room, making note of the positions of doors and determining which people posed threats and which did not. She did not look for a weapon.

He should know. He had done the same thing.

(Neither one of them needed a weapon to be dangerous).

( _The mirror hurts, Cassian,_ Draven said in his head. _There are people out there that will remind you of yourself -- because of loss, or circumstance, or pity. You need to be able to do what has to be done regardless, but there is no escaping the hurt that comes from seeing your own self reflected in the eyes of another._ )

He stepped out of the shadows deliberately, watching to see her reaction. No one else saw it, hidden in her micro-expressions, but he did.

A slight tightening of the corners of her mouth. Her eyes narrowed just a fraction. Her head cocked just a single degree to the left.

He’d just become her greatest threat in the room.

“When was the last time you were in contact with your father?”

“Fifteen years ago,” her voice was clear and sharp, chilled like the icy frost that used to cover the ground on Fest even during the summer months.

She glared defiantly at him, like a child being difficult just for the hell of it.

(Cassian absolutely _did not_ notice her eyes, the way they reflected back at him.)

“Any idea where he’s been all the time?” he asked again, and it can out far too even and reasonable, but it was taking all his years of spying to keep the snarl out of his voice.

(They were green, her eyes -- at least, he thought so. They… shifted. Changed. Green and brown and the faintest gray-blue, all swirled around the golden flecks that looked like pieces of the sun.)

(They burned with _need_ ).

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN: Eadu** **)**

 

The scope cast Galen Erso in an unnatural green light. It warped the colors of things, but allowed him to see shapes clearly through all the unceasing rain this planet had to offer.

There were other people -- _witnesses_ \-- out there on the platform with Erso. Scientists, maybe, but soldiers too. And the deathtroopers that flanked the man in the white cape.

If -- _when_ \-- he killed Galen Erso, those troopers would hunt him. He and Kay would need a new ship; there was no way they could hide from Imperial deathtroopers for more than a handful of days, not in this weather.

_Not if he was also being hunted by Jyn, for killing her father._

He pushed that thought away, just as he had pushed thoughts of her away in the Partisan prison cell. They were distracting, these thoughts of her, and he had been fighting long enough to know how it ended when operatives were distracted.

He’d had to clean up those situations, sometimes.

But Jyn Erso was not there to stop him or distract him, and the crowd on the platform had shifted to the point where he had a clear shot--

(Galen Erso had Jyn’s eyes. Dark, sorrowful, staring, except that his were surrounded by a weather-beaten, drawn face, the face of a man weary of war, of the part he had to play to defeat his enemies--)

(It was the face of a man who had lost his family and devoted himself to the war instead)

 _The mirror hurts, indeed_.

Cassian saw Jyn’s eyes in his head and Galen’s eyes in his scope.

He swept the rifle aside and felt the rain beat down on him as he bowed his head.

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN: Yavin IV** **)**

 

Cassian couldn’t find it in himself to regret his decision.

On Eadu, when he’d made the decision not to kill Galen Erso, he had realized something.

Jyn Erso was _powerful_ \-- he’d always known that. That’s why he’d known better than to judge her by her size in the war room on Yavin.

She was powerful because she _fought_. Always.

But she was also powerful because, despite herself and her past, she _cared_.

He’d seen it when she was gentle with Bodhi after their escape from Jedha, when she pulled herself up that unending ladder to reach her father before Krennic could have killed him.

(When she’d taken out that squad of troopers on Jedha, before they could shoot him).

Jyn Erso was powered by need and hope. Those two things tangled inside her, urging her to fight, to act impulsively, and to build herself a family of misfits event though she’d lost hers twice before.

Need and hope burned like a fire inside her, hotter than rage and brighter than bitterness.

On Eadu, when he’d made the decision not to kill Galen Erso, Cassian Andor had realized that he cared for Jyn Erso.

(Some spy he was).

That realization came too late.

Galen Erso died in a hailstorm of Alliance bombers.

For one, heart-stopping moment, Cassian had thought she was dead.

( _not her_ ).

It wasn’t like when he’d found her on Jedha -- she wasn’t catatonic. She fought him, when he first tried to drag her away, but he persisted. She remained numb after that, simply following him, as they raced ahead of the troopers.

When she screamed at him, onboard the stolen shuttle, he understood. He’d known, as soon as he looked into her (deep green, gold-flecked) eyes that she hated him. He was the man who killed her father.

(Why did that thought make him feel so empty and cold, as if something in his chest had broken into pieces, leaving a great black hole where it had once been?)

But then he got angry. He’d spent more than half of his life fighting this fight, committing atrocity after atrocity so that others wouldn’t have to. He’d tortured and killed and maimed for the sake of a world that he would not live to see -- one without the rule of the Empire bearing down on it.

So he shouted back. She’d abandoned the fight years ago, chosen to run away from her problems, to ignore the fighting and the suffering she saw around her every day.

At least he’d _done something_. At least if he was going to hell, he knew he was doing it so that others wouldn’t have to -- and so that one day the Empire would burn there too.

So when he returned from Eadu and saw Draven standing in the war room, red-faced, with his disappointed-in-failure glare setting his features in stone, Cassian did nothing.

And when he saw that the Council would not listen to Jyn, and he turned to leave, Draven caught his arm.

“Was it worth it?” the General asked, surveying the room full of senators that was soon going to explode in debate.

Cassian’s eyes swept the room, his gaze stopping on the figure of Jyn Erso -- the woman who frustrates him, makes him reckless. The woman he _cares_ about.

“Yes.”

\------------------------------

 **(** **NOW** **)**

 

_I’m dead._

This is his first thought, upon waking in the darkness.

His second thought is a mental scream, from the fiery pain that raced up and down his spine.

_Death is only rest for those who live good lives. The evil, the killers, beware -- Death, when it comes for you, will not be peaceful._

He couldn’t remember where he’d heard that before. He would've laughed in grim humor if his entire spine were not being ripped apart and forged back together in the same instant.

His arms twitched, shifted -- but all he felt was cold. The last time he’d felt anything, Jyn had been in his arms, warm and alive and breathing--

_Of course Jyn isn’t going to be here. She doesn’t deserve to be damned in hell with you._

White, piercing light stabbed through his eyelids. Voices, yelling, a strange, erratic beeping -- the noises cut through his brain, digging deep into his skull.

“Cassian?”

He _knew_ that voice. _Knew_ it, cherished it -- never, ever wanted to lose it.

_Jyn._

She shouldn't be in hell with him. She deserved whatever kind of peace she could gain in death.

She deserved better than him.

She _always_ had.

He might’ve tried to tell her that, before he fell under again.

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN: Scarif** **)**

 

The elevator was dark, calm, peaceful. Jyn stood near to him, not speaking, just being there. Being with him.

He wanted to kiss her.

It seized him with a fiery demand, a _need_ , that would not be ignored. He shifted towards her, and she looked up at him, her eyes wide--

But he pushed it aside, again. Jyn deserved better than that.

She deserved to be able to die -- because that’s what was waiting for them at the foot of the tower, death -- without having his feelings forced upon her. She deserved to die alongside someone she might even consider a friend, without having to doubt him, doubt her trust in him.

(Maybe it was good that they die now, each in their own little delusions; Cassian that Jyn might care for him, Jyn that Cassian was a good man. Maybe it was better this way, that they never learned the answers to their questions; maybe it was better that this ended before they had a chance to start.)

(If they survived, she would leave. She thought he was a good man, an honorable soldier of the Rebellion, but he wasn’t. She would learn that, if they survived, and she would leave him behind. She would take everything with her.)

(And he wouldn’t even try to stop her, because she deserved better than anything he could’ve given her. How was he supposed to ask her to love the man who killed her father?)

The elevator stopped. They stepped out, Cassian still leaning his weight on Jyn.

They struggled towards the beach together.

\------------------------------

 **(** **NOW** **)**

 

They’d survived.

The Death Star had been destroyed.

They were adrift, with the rest of the Rebellion, trying to outrun the Empire’s forces. Cassian was still bedridden, unable to move much for fear of prolonging his healing process.

Jyn came into his room every day. She sat and held his hand -- sometimes she told him things, about herself or the Rebellion or what obscure piece of wisdom Chirrut had shared at breakfast that morning.

He always pretended to be asleep, when she was there. It was quieter; easier, when he was not expected to reply. He had never been a talkative person, but she made him want to tell her everything, just by being there. She made him want to be the man she thought he was.

And that was a dangerous thing.

Sometimes, he was truly asleep when she came in, and that saddened him the most; because even if he never responded, just knowing she was there and hearing her voice made him happier than he had any right to be.

There were times when he wanted to wake up. To reach out and touch her hand, to speak to her--

But then he remembered himself. Someday, he was going to have to own up and tell her of every horrible deed he’d ever done for the Rebellion. That was the day he was going to lose her.

He just wasn’t ready to lose her quite yet.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I read through all of your comments and just... Wow. You're all super kind and amazing and I honestly can't believe you liked this story that much.
> 
> I hope this second chapter doesn't disappoint.

Captain Cassian Andor of Rebel Intelligence was not a good man.

He was a liar and a thief and a saboteur and an assassin. He had murdered and tortured and turned himself into one of the most despicable kinds of men: those who did what needed to be done.

It was not an easy job. It was not rewarding. It cut into his soul again and again and again; haunted his dreams and the dark space behind his eyelids. The ghosts, the voices, of the people whose lives he’d taken; they were his constant companions, his penance for the sins he had committed.

He could not take back a single action that he had committed in the name of the cause.

(That didn’t mean he didn’t regret them all, every single day).

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN: Home One** **)**

 

When Cassian woke up, he spent nearly a month in inconsistent bacta immersion therapy, to help his injured muscles and tissue acclimate to the implants that had saved his life.

After that, he was scheduled for six months’ worth of bi-weekly physical therapy sessions, to ensure that his spine would relearn to walk properly.

(He went to one session before he convinced Draven to sign off on his right to go against medical advice).

It still galls him, sometimes, how limited he is. His injuries get aggravated by the smallest things; a slight dip in the onboard temperature of the ship, or just by sitting for too long in the same position. Sometimes they act up with no cause, and when they do he stumbles.

(It is particularly galling then, when his body acts against him for no apparent reason. If Jyn is there, she holds him up and helps him until the pain has subsided. It hurts, then, not because of his spine but because Jyn is strong; and all he’s shown her since he woke up from Scarif is weakness).

When Jyn formally enlisted as a sergeant in the Army of the Alliance to Restore the Republic, Cassian felt a dark weight lift from his chest.

(He’d been terrified that she was going to leave. She didn’t owe him anything; there was no obligation for her to stay with him, or even say goodbye before she left. He wished he was in a position where he would be entitled to such knowledge about her; but it was probably better that he leave that place for those who deserved it).

When she applied for a transfer from Ground Forces to Alliance Intelligence, he used up what little political capital he had left after Scarif to ensure that he would be selected as her Commanding Officer, so that he would have discretion over the missions she received.

(He never wanted her to have to do the things he’s done).

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **NOW** **)**

 

Sevarcos II was a dusty, canyon-covered planet, home to the galaxy’s three biggest spice lords. Xerxes Quintas, Trevael, and Cassius Nolath Rha traded spice to every corner of the galaxy in the names of the Sevari clans they represented.

They weren’t ~~Jyn’s~~ his target. Maybe they should be -- maybe in a kinder world, they would be -- but his objective was not to put an end to the interstellar spice cartel.

His target was Imperial Vice Admiral Perwin Gedde, infamous spice addict, and the unofficial Imperial liaison to the spice lords of Sevarcos II.

Intelligence had a man ready to take Gedde’s place -- both in the Imperial Navy, and in relations with the criminal underworld of the galaxy. But before that could happen, Gedde needed to die.

This was why the Rebellion had men like Cassian Andor.

Cassian allowed his fingers to run over the leatherbound hilt of the vibroblade he held concealed under his jacket, as Gedde walked closer and closer.

(He was never going to see Jyn Erso again. Even if she had stayed with the Rebellion, she would never speak to him again.)

(But it’s okay. He could deal with missing her -- could learn to live with the tight hole in his chest that ached whenever he thought about golden-flecked eyes and warm, infectious laughter.)

(It was worth it, to keep her from having to do this.)

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN: Home One** **)**

 

They had a tradition, whenever one of them returned from a mission.

Rogue One had splintered, when the Alliance evacuated. Jyn became Cassian's partner in Intelligence; Bodhi had gone off and joined Luke Skywalker and Wedge Antilles in Red and eventually Rogue Squadrons; and Baze and Chirrut had never actually enlisted anywhere.

(He tried not to think about Kaytoo. He had a backup, hidden on the datastick that he carried with him always; but he didn’t know if he could bear to do it. He’d led the droid -- his only friend, the only one who had never betrayed him -- to his death, while Cassian walked away unscathed. He couldn’t find it in himself to reboot the droid, who would have no memory of being torn apart by Imperial blasters while sacrificing himself for a mission he hadn’t chosen to accept).

There was a boiler room cantina, in the depths of Home One, where pilots and soldiers would gather and drink hooch and moonshine (and stronger, more expensive liquors, when Supplies managed it).

Whenever one of them returned from a mission, all five of them would grab drinks and sit crowded together in the corner table they had claimed as their own.

(Cassian chose it, the first night he’d been released from the medbay after Scarif, because it allowed him to view the entire room while keeping his back to a solid wall. He’d sat there, nursing a corellian whiskey in silent tribute to those he’d led to their deaths, until Jyn had found him. She said nothing, just set her ale down and sat, joining him in his vigil; silent in their sorrow but connected nonetheless.)

Bodhi would relay stories of his escapades in the newly-minted Rogue Squadron; and Cassian took note of how his voice trembled less and less each time.

(Jyn tensed, whenever she heard Bodhi stutter. Cassian knew that she felt some sort of guilt for whatever method of torture Saw had used on the pilot; but she could not keep blaming herself for it. He wanted to tell her that she was not responsible for the sins of her fathers -- biological or adopted -- that she was far more than what her past made her think she was. He wanted to tell her so many things -- but he could not. The more distance he kept between them, the less it would hurt her when she learned the truth and chose to leave.)

(It was too late for him, already. There was no avoiding how much it would hurt him when she left).

Neither Baze nor Chirrut had ever officially enlisted in any position within the Rebellion, so far as Cassian knew. But no matter where the Alliance set up base, the Guardians remained with the rest of Rogue One; they were the parents of their little family. Baze could drink Solo’s wookiee under the table, while Chirrut’s drunken shenanigans usually devolved into slurred lectures about the will of the Force punctuated with random bouts of hysterical laughter.

Jyn would smile and laugh, her face lighter and more carefree than any other time Cassian had seen it. As the night wore on, she would relax more, giggling, leaning into Cassian’s side for support.

(It felt _right_ , to have her that close, and Cassian had to stop himself from pulling her closer; her warmth and scent and the way the wisps of her hair tickled his neck ever-so-softly intoxicated him, made him lower his guard somewhat).

(She only did it when she was drunk. It didn’t mean anything to her, even if it meant the world to him. Cassian would never betray her trust like that).

(Her trust was the only thing he had left that meant anything).

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **NOW** **)**

 

It was cold, where they’d imprisoned him. Bitterly, bitterly cold, the kind of chill that settles into your bones and heart and stays there until you’ve either succumbed or escaped.

Cassian had no hope for either. The toxins in his system would kill him long before the emptiness of space could -- and in a far more painful manner.

In his life Before -- before Rogue One, before Scarif, before _Jyn_ \-- he wouldn’t have cared that this was where he was going to die. He wouldn’t have cared that he was going to die, alone and abandoned and forgotten, on an obscure planet in the Outer Rim.

(It was hubris to think that he could have a choice in where he was going to die. Death acted upon the whims of no man.)

(If he had to die, he would have wanted to die on Scarif, with Jyn, back when she still believed there was something in him worth hoping for.)

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN: Home One** **)**

 

Cassian Andor knew what jealousy was. He understood it. He’d even caused it, one way or another; jealousy was a vicious, blinding emotion, that caused a narrowing of focus and an inattentiveness to important details.

He, as a spy, had seen jealousy and its effects far too many times to fall prey to it himself.

Which is why it meant _absolutely nothing_ when Jyn chose to go with Bodhi and talk to the pilots of Rogue Squadron. It meant _nothing_ when those cocky, self-assured pilots kept blatantly flirting with her.

It meant _nothing_ when Han Solo made Jyn throw back her head and howl with laughter.

(Cassian had never managed to make her laugh. All she ever gave him were tired smiles at the end of long missions, or brief hugs -- brief moments of closeness when they brushed too close to death).

_You can’t keep her close like that forever. Jyn Erso could have anyone she wanted in the entire kriffing Rebellion; you really think she would choose you over anyone else?_

Cassian threw back his glass of corellian whiskey in an attempt to drown out the voice in his head and the image of Jyn _happy_ \-- _he’d never been enough to make her happy --_ because of _that smuggler._

(He wanted it to be him. He wanted, more than anything, to be the man she thought he was; to be enough to make her happy, to be good enough to deserve her.)

(He knew that he would never get any of that.)

(And it _hurt_.)

It _shouldn't_ hurt, by now. He always knew that this relationship they'd cobbled together was going to end one day; all he'd had was the time he could steal until it became necessary for him to tell her the things he’d done.

That’s when she would leave him. She would walk away from him and never come back and he wouldn’t even try to stop her.

(He'd known, when he joined Intelligence, that he was going to have to sacrifice the things that meant the most to him. He knew that if he ever met someone who meant to him what Jyn means to him now, he was going to have to let them go. Just like he was going to have to let her go now -- go far away from him, go find someone who might actually deserve someone like her, someone who could actually make her happy.)

(He couldn’t ask her to love him; he’d given up his chance to love her when he caused the death of her father.)

“Stop pining and tell her you love her,” Baze growled, shoving another drink at him. Cassian had forgotten that the other man was still sitting at the table with him.

“It doesn’t matter,” he murmured, standing to leave.

(Jyn was still joking with the pilots, still laughing. Her face was alight with joy -- she looked, for a moment, like any other twenty-one-year-old woman in the galaxy, instead of the soldier he knew her to be.)

(He couldn’t make her laugh like that. He couldn’t make her happy like that. He’d given too much of himself to the war for there to be enough left for Jyn. He’d give her all the galaxy if he could, but he couldn’t -- all he had were a handful of the broken pieces of his heart and a bloody, soul-crushing war that he would not live to see the end of. Jyn Erso deserved more than that.)

“You could just _tell her_ ,” Baze called out, as Cassian left. “It would make this all a lot less painful for the rest of us!”

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **NOW** **)**

 

Cassian couldn’t feel his body. He was about 86% percent certain he wasn’t dead yet -- the confused buzzing in his brain seemed to confirm that -- but he was clearly well on his way there.

The cold had ceased to matter. He’d fallen on his back at some point, and lay there, limp, staring off into the grayness of the room they’d locked him in.

An unaccountable amount of time had passed by the time Jyn appeared.

He knew it was a hallucination, brought on by his subconscious in a desperate attempt to waylay the spread of the drug. Real Jyn -- the Jyn that hated him, who had never, ever loved him -- was a thousand lightyears away from there; safe, with Bodhi and Chirrut and Baze.

(At least he hadn’t take her family away from her when he left).

Fake Jyn faded away almost as quickly as she appeared. He saw others, too; countless victims, innocent and not, that he’d killed; even K-2SO’s hulking metal frame was conjured up to torment him in his final moments.

As the ghosts of his past paraded past to haunt him, Cassian screwed his eyes shut in a desperate attempt to clear his mind.

All he could see were a pair of shifting, gold-flecked green eyes; a woman who had reminded him so much of himself, before he realized that she was _good_ and he _was not._

( _The mirror hurts, Cassian._ )

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN: Onboard the** **_Salvation_ ** **)**

 

Cassian swam to consciousness slowly, like his mind was being pulled from a hazy fog.

The first thing he heard was sound of sobbing.

The second thing he was aware of was the familiar weight of Jyn’s hand over his. He could feel the raised skin of the knife scar that stretched across her palm, the callouses on her fingertips from years of warfare.

 _Jyn_.

_(Sobbing?)_

He wanted to know what was wrong. He wanted to stop whatever had caused that.

Cassian Andor made a decision then; his brain still hazy from the painkillers, but clear enough to make the choice.

It was time for him to wake up.

(She needed him.)

“Jyn?” he whispered, his voice hoarse from weeks of disuse. His eyes cracked open, blinking rapidly in the harsh white light of the medbay.

Jyn sat next to his cot, both her hands over his. Pieces of her dark hair had escaped from her bun and fell into her eyes.

(Cassian wanted to reach out and brush back the unruly wisps of her hair. He wanted to touch the soft skin of her cheek, fit his hand to the gentle curve of her jawline…)

Her eyes were red-rimmed, as if she’d been crying. Another tear fell silently down her face.

(Cassian hated seeing her cry. Jyn Erso deserved all the happiness that war and circumstance had cheated her out of getting as a child.)

“Cassian,” she whispered, leaning over more so that she could run one hand through his hair. “You’re awake.”

( _I have been for weeks,_ his mind supplied,  _I was just too selfish to tell you.)_

“Don’t cry, Jyn,” he begged, soothed by the steady movement of her fingers against his scalp. He moved his hand so that it grasped hers, tangling their fingers together.

(He wondered what kinds of painkillers the doctors had him on, to make him this honest and unafraid.)

“I missed you, Cass,” she murmured as he heard the doctors enter the room. She pulled away from him then and he wanted to protest -- he missed her, missed her warmth, didn’t want her to ever move away from him.

(What the hell did the medical staff put in that IV?)

But she was back as soon as the doctors finished their checks, her warm hands over his. Cassian felt himself being pulled under by drugs again; felt the world start to return to that hazy, clouded warmth.

“Stay,” He whispered, suddenly afraid that she would’ve left by the time he woke up again. “Please, Jyn.”

“I’m not going anywhere, Cassian. I’m here to stay.”  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There will be another chapter to this, I promise.
> 
> I'm on tumblr as starxdust22


	3. Chapter 3

_and the rest is rust and stardust._

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **NOW** **)**

 

The last time he had thought he was dead, he had been in surgery after Scarif; had awakened later to find Jyn Erso sitting next to him, her scarred, calloused hands pressed over his.

That was not going to happen this time.

Cassian was not dead yet, but he was dying. Even now, his brain was growing numb, as each lobe was shut down by the spread of the toxins.

Flaming, fiery needles pierced his veins, scalding as if his blood was boiling.

(Cassian)

(Cassian can you hear me)

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN:Yavin IV** **)**

 

“This is an unwise course of action.

“Shut up, Kay,” Cassian growled, moving past him.

“You are displaying erratic and illogical behavior. I was not aware that there was a variable in this environment that was sufficiently powerful to cause you such a loss of faculties,” the mechanical components inside the droid audibly whirred to life as it revisited its calculations.

Cassian stopped in his tracks, turning to glance over his shoulder at the droid. “You really underestimated her, didn't you?”

“Are you referring to the small, annoying human who calls herself Jyn Erso? Is _Jyn Erso_ the reason you have developed these strange behavioral patterns?”

_You have no idea._

“So you _did_ underestimate her,” Cassian replied, smirking. “You, the strategic analysis specialist, failed to anticipate the statistical impact of Jyn Erso.”

“You underestimated her, as well,” Kay huffed in return, clearly offended at Cassian's disparagement of his statistics.

Cassian shook his head. “No. I didn't.”

_(The mirror hurts, Cassian.)_

“Here,” Kaytu muttered, pulling the datastick from where it plugged into his metal chassis and shoving it at Cassian. “I have updated my backup. Are you now sufficiently convinced that this mission poses no threat to my operational security?”

“Not really,” Cassian replied honestly, as the two of them left the droid bay and ascended to the ground floor of the ziggurat.

If everyone he'd talked to had done what they were supposed to, he'd have just under twenty operatives to offer Jyn.

(It wasn't nearly enough, for what she had to do. He didn't even know if she'd accept it, his gift -- or if she'd turn it away, because he killed her father.)

“There is no reason for you to be concerned; as a droid, I have one of the highest chances of survival, after yourself, because I have prioritized your survival over mine” Kay continued, unaware of how truly unwelcome such information was.

(Cassian didn't want to know the chances that he was leading almost two dozen rebel soldiers into certain death.)

“And Jyn?” he asked, pausing in his stride. “What chance does Jyn have of making it out alive?”

“I… was not aware that you were so vested in her… odds,” Kay spoke slowly, haltingly, the way he did when he knew what he was about to say would not be well received.

“Jyn Erso's odds of surviving the Scarif operation are less than four percent.”

(Jyn. Jyn, with her fire-soul and her flaming eyes and her fierce words. Jyn was going to die, and he, Cassian Andor, was going to live.)

(Was going to have to live without her.)

“Change the odds, Kay,” he snarled. “Change your priorities. Jyn needs to survive. You have to _be there_ to make sure she does.”

“Are you intending to die on this mission, Cassian?”

“I don’t know,” he replied, slowing to a halt as he saw the crowd of rebels -- pathfinders and ground forces, mostly -- that had gathered in the central hangar of Base One.

Jyn walked out of the war room, her eyes blazing, frustration evident in her tense shoulders and fisted hands.

_I believe her._

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **NOW** **)**

 

Cassian’s eyes flew open and he shot upright.

His heart was racing. His breathing was hard, fast, labored. His hand, when he held it upright, shook uncontrollably.

His vision was hazy, unfocused. Lights flared up, and grew dimmer; colors shifted, mixed, separated again. His fingertips buzzed.

_(What had they done to him?)_

“Shh, Cass,” a voice murmured, soothingly. Warm, calloused  hands grabbed his shoulders, pushed him back down onto the (solid, rock-hard, military-issue) cot. “It’s okay.”

_Jyn?_

“J’n,” he tried to say, but his tongue was thick and numb and his voice slurred. His head lolled backwards, the shapes of the pipes on the ceiling of the hold spinning in front of his eyes.

“I’m here, Cassi,” she whispered as the buzzing in his fingertips abated.

“N’ r’ly you,” he rasped, his head still swimming. Jyn had not come back for him. It just was another cruel trick the toxin was playing.“Faek J’n.”

“I’m not a hallucination, Cassian,” she replied, moving one of her hands to run through his hair just like she had when he woke up from Scarif. “The toxins are almost out of your system. I’m here for real, I promise.”

(Her fingers were warm, soothing, where they moved against his scalp. He turned his face into his arm, his nose pressed up against the inside of her wrist.)

 _She felt like Jyn_.

He grabbed her free hand, from where it rested against his shoulder, ran his fingers over her palm.

Felt the familiar raised lines of a knife wound, slicing across her hand.

“It’s me, Cassi,” she murmured again. “I found Kaytu. I’m here.”

“Jyn,” he whispered, his lips still pressed against the skin of her arm. He felt his head start to clear, the shifting colors and shapes resolve themselves into the familiar features of a stolen cargo ship.

He saw Jyn -- _real_ Jyn, living, breathing _Jyn_ \-- leaning over him. With her flyaway hair and her shifting, gold-flecked eyes.

_She was here. She was real._

_(she had come back for him?)_

Exhaustion crashed over him in a wave, as whatever stim shot they had injected him with finally wore off. He felt tired, down into his bones.

The last thing he did before his eyelids drifted shut was pull Jyn just the slightest bit closer.

Her warmth melted into him, chased away the cold memory of his cell.

_(she came back for him.)_

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN: Home One** **)**

 

Jyn Erso was stubborn and brash and willful. She was fierce and protective and far more inclined towards fight than flight.

(She was also, now, apparently, a moony-eyed teenager with a crush. It annoyed her to no end, what he could do to her with just a look -- but then he would look up at her, through those few pieces of hair that kept falling onto his forehead, and she would remember why. She got lost in his (deep, chocolate-colored, impossibly expressive) eyes far too often for it to go unnoticed.)

(He would leave her, if he did notice. If he knew how he made her feel -- how every time he brushed her skin she felt a bolt of electricity, how being around him made her intoxicated and _happy_ , how she wanted to pull his stupidly attractive face down to hers and smash their mouths together -- he wouldn’t want her as his partner anymore.)

(He would leave her behind, just like everyone else, because he didn’t love her back.)

(Every woman and half of the men in the Rebellion would jump at the chance to be with him in that way. Jyn Erso was nothing special in all that.)

Cassian had missed breakfast that morning. He didn’t always make it, but… he was usually there the morning after they spent the night at the cantina.

(He teased her sometimes, about the way she acted when she was drunk. She leaned heavily on him, with her inhibitions lowered, laughed hysterically.)

(His eyes lit up, when he told stories like that, all golden-brown and warm.)

(Drunk Jyn was brave enough to lean into him, to be closer, to try for what she wanted . Sober Jyn was decidedly not that brave.)

So she’d hacked into the Intelligence database --

(“So… we have a mission, tomorrow? Corulag, is it?”

“That’s only on the classified database, Jyn,” He’d replied, while stuffing an extra blaster into his pack. (she still hadn’t returned the one she’d stolen.)

“That’s where I’m looking.”

He glanced up at her, and she let a smug smirk stretch across her face. “And what do you think of Intel’s cybersecurity?”

“I think it would be a good idea,” she replied.

She’d gotten a genuine, warm-eyed smile for that one.)

\--and found his mission files.

(She’d seen them before, of course, but she… she hadn’t opened them. It seemed wrong, like an invasion of privacy. She knew he hated the things he’d had to do, and she… she didn’t want to force him to share that burden with her.)

 

 **Alliance Intelligence Operation 384712083** \-- FILE UPDATED [0.6.13.0930 ABY]

 **Mission Objective:** [requires auth code 07728-delta]

 **Requested Operative(s):** Ser. Jyn Erso -- NOT APPROVED

 **Commanding Officer:** Capt. Cassian Andor

 **Fallback Operatives:** Capt. Cassian Andor -- (vol.) APPROVED

 **Objective status:** complete

 **Operative status:** KIA

**Mission Report:**

**Mission Termination:** APPROVED

 **Extraction:** N/A

 

“You bastard,” she whispered. He’d never even told her that she’d been selected for this mission.

He’d just taken the burden on himself, without telling her.

_(Why didn’t you tell me?)_

_(Why didn’t you trust me?)_

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN: Home One** **)**

 

“What the hell is this?” Cassian snarled.

“I put in a requisition order for a third grade operative under your command to complete a third grade mission on Sevarcos II,” Draven replied smoothly, opening the file and skimming over it before replacing it on his desk.

“I fail to see your complaint.”

“Jyn Erso is not a third grade operative,” he growled, knowing that he was revealing far too much to Draven, too furious to care. “She’s not expendable.”

( _Never, ever expendable.)_

“She is the _most_ expendable,” Draven replied. “She’s a hero to the entire Rebellion. ‘The woman who went rogue’, or whatever slogan they thought up for her down in Prop.”

“You kill her and you’ll have a riot on your hands--”

“By the fucking Force, Cassian, use your head! I taught you this!” Draven shot back. “I taught you how to manipulate people -- to pull the possible reactions and determine the best course with which to proceed. Why is Jyn Erso expendable?”

 _She isn’t,_ his thoughts screamed, _and she never will be. And she will never do the things you’ve made me do for you._

 _(She’s a hero,_ the darker part of his mind hissed, the part that was an assassin and a soldier and a spy. _Everyone knows her. Everyone cares about her.)_

_(Heroes make great stories, but martyrs are the ones people die to avenge.)_

“You’re going to use her death to motivate the Rebellion.”

“You see, Cassian?” Draven asked, handing the file back to him. “I didn’t even need to tell you that. You _knew_ that that was Jyn Erso’s best use to the Alliance. You might pretend to belong with these rogues -- but you’re still the spy I trained you to be. You will be, for as long as the war goes on.”

Cassian had turned and walked away from Draven -- but he could not walk away from the ghosts that lived inside his own head.

_(You’re still the spy I trained you to be.)_

Cassian had always known that the scars he earned, the changes he underwent in Intelligence would never go away. He knew that he was never truly going to be anything more than Captain Cassian Andor, spy and murderer.

He’d thought… he’d thought that Jyn had _changed_ him. He’d thought that maybe, one day, her hope might show him how to be a good man.

( _Jyn’s hope is for herself, and her friends, and the end of the war. Jyn does not hope for you.)_

_(But I hope for her.)_

He’d considered Jyn’s death. In his own head, his own rational thoughts, her death had _made sense_.

_(I would never hurt her.)_

_(Monster. Betrayer. Murderer. This is why she does not love you.)_

There were no fallback operatives, no one to go to the spice lords instead of Jyn.

Cassian turned his stride towards the shuttle bay, ignoring everyone he passed in the hallways.

It is suicide, to go to Sevarcos II without an extraction plan, without a backup team -- without any equipment save for his comm and the vibroblade strapped to his boot.

_(You’re still the spy I trained you to be.)_

_I will never hurt Jyn._

_(You will be, for as long as the war goes on.)_

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **NOW** **)**

The first thing Cassian was aware of was the warm, heavy mass of another body lying on top of his own.

The second thing he realized was the pounding of head in the aftermath of whatever antidote and stim shot Jyn had forced him to take.

His eyes blinked open, and the world took shape around him.

(Jyn lay curled in his arms, her cheek pressed to his collarbone, one hand curled over his heart. Her breathing was deep and even as she slept, her sleep peaceful as was so very rare for soldiers like them.)

A KX-series Imperial Security droid stood in the hold, its eyes glowing white in the dim light.

Cassian didn’t dare to hope, but-- “Kay?”

“You didn’t activate my backup,” the droid stated, its vocoder lowered to avoid waking the sleeping Jyn. “ And it’s been five months since the destruction of my previous iteration. Did you not want me back?”

“No, Kay, no. Never,” Cassian whispered. His hesitation had nothing to do with the droid and everything -- everything -- to do with his failure to protect his friend in the data vault. “I just… I couldn’t.”

Kaytoo’s servomotors whirled for a moment before he responded. “Elaborate.”

“I…” Cassian swallowed, began again. “On Scarif, when you… died, Kay, it was because I left you behind. Jyn and I went into the data vault and we left you at the command console.”

“That was the correct choice, Cassian.”

“How?” Cassian laughed without humor. “It failed. You died because we left you strategically vulnerable. You died because _I_ failed to look out for you.”

“That is not true, Cassian. I am not dead,” Kay responded matter-of-factly.

“You aren’t disposable, either!”

“I… do not really know how to stay this,” Kaytoo stated, unsure, “but… you say that your actions that led to my demise were… completely wrong, and that… is not true.

“You made the decision to leave me because you knew -- and my past iteration would have known -- that that gave you and Jyn and myself the greatest chances of survival. It did not work out for me as well as it did for you and Jyn, but… just because the actions you take have negative consequences does not necessarily make you at fault for making those choices.

“I do not blame you for my demise, Cassian. I am not dead, and you are not a bad person.”

_(You are not a bad person.)_

He didn’t know how he felt about that, about what Kay thought, but he rapped his free hand against the cool metal of the droid’s chassis and let it walk back to the cockpit.

“He’s right, you know,” Jyn murmured, awakened by Kaytoo’s heavy tread as he clomped away. Her green-gray eyes blinked up at him, still hazy from sleep.

_(there was nothing in the galaxy that compared to this woman.)_

“Hmmm?”

“You’re not a bad person, Cass,” she said, nuzzling into his chest. “You’re a good person who had to do bad things.”

“You shouldn't have come for me, Jyn,” he whispered. “I took the mission, I knew the risks--”

“I love you, Cassi,” she interrupted, not looking at him, avoiding eye contact. His heart seized at her words--

 

_(I love you, Cassi.)_

_(You are not a bad person..)_

_(I love you)_

 

“--I wasn’t going to let you die when it should have been me, instead."

“I’m never going to let you do the things I’ve done,” he declared, trying to avoid getting distracted as her fingers started running circles over his heart. “And you’re never going to be expendable.”

“But you have to let me do my missions, too,” she replied, finally looking up at him. “You need to trust me.”

“I’ve always trusted you,” he replied simply. (He was a liar. He was a spy and a liar, but this woman pulled the truth from his veins and made his heart relearn what it meant to hope.) “I love you.”

“I know,” she whispered, picking her head up to look at him, their faces only inches apart. He pressed his forehead against hers, in silence, waiting.

They lay together, and breathed.

And they were home.

 

\------------------------------

 **(** **THEN: Yavin IV** **)**

 

He couldn’t tell Jyn everything he needed to tell her. He couldn’t tell her about his mission on Jenoport, or his stints undercover on Coruscant, or the Carida military academy where he’d watched his father die, or Admiral Grendreef--

There wasn’t the time. If they were going to steal the plans, they had to leave _now_.

He’d tried to tell her the things he’d done, tried to make her understand what kind of man she was placing her trust in.

_Spies, Saboteurs, assassins. Everything we did, we did for the Rebellion._

_Everything_ I _did, I did for the Rebellion._

_And every time I walked away from something I wanted to forget…_

But he had failed, clearly, in making her understand who and what he was.

He walked closer, just barely able to keep a smile off of his face as he drew nearer to her, like a moon caught forever in the gravity of the sun, never to escape its orbit.

(She wouldn’t be looking at him like that if she knew the things he’d done.)

_I told myself it was for a cause I believed in._

“I’m not used to people sticking around when things go bad,” she said, and the way her eyes glimmered made his heart clench.

“Welcome home,” he whispered, leaning in close enough to see the individual flecks, like constellations in her eyes.

She smiled back up at him, and he knew he could never regret the decisions that had led him there, or the ones that would follow after.

_A cause that was worth it._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it!
> 
> I'm not 100% happy with this third chapter, but I figured I would post it now and fix things later.
> 
> Thank you all so much for sticking with this fic. It was so much more well-recieved than I ever expected and you're all wonderful

**Author's Note:**

> First time ever writing fanfic. Let me know what you thought.


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